Now fades the glimmering landscape on the sight,
And all the air a solemn stillness holds,

Save where the beetle wheels his droning flight,
And drowsy tinklings lull the distant folds:

Save that from yonder ivy-mantled tower,

The moping owl does to the moon complain Of such as, wandering near her secret bower, Molest her ancient solitary reign.

Beneath those rugged elms, that yew-tree's shade, Where heaves the turf in many a mouldering heap, Each in his narrow cell for ever laid,

The rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep.

The breezy call of incense-breathing morn,

The swallow twittering from the straw-built shed, The cock's shrill clarion, or the echoing horn, No more shall rouse them from their lowly bed.

For them no more the blazing hearth shall burn,
Or busy housewife ply her evening care;

No children run to lisp their sire's return,

Or climb his knees the envied kiss to share.

Oft did the harvest to their sickle yield,

Their furrow oft the stubborn glebe has broke: How jocund did they drive their team afield!

How bow'd the woods beneath their sturdy stroke!

Let not ambition mock their useful toil,

Their homely joys, and destiny obscure;
Nor grandeur hear with a disdainful smile
The short and simple annals of the poor.

The boast of heraldry, the pomp of power,
And all that beauty, all that wealth e'er gave,
Await alike the inevitable hour.

The paths of glory lead but to the grave.

Nor you, ye proud, impute to these the fault,

If memory o'er their tomb no trophies raise, Where through the long-drawn aisle and fretted van!t The pealing anthem swells the note of praise.

Can storied urn, or animated bust,

Back to its mansion call the fleeting breath? Can honor's voice provoke the silent dust,

Or flattery soothe the dull cold ear of death?

Perhaps in this neglected spot is laid

Some heart once pregnant with celestial fire; Hands, that the rod of empire might have swayed. Or waked to ecstasy the living lyre:

But knowledge to their eyes her ample page
Rich with the spoils of time did ne'er unroll;

Chill penury repress'd their noble rage,

And froze the genial current of the soul.

Full many a gem of purest ray serene

The dark unfathom'd caves of ocean bear:
Full many a flower is born to blush unseen,
And waste its sweetness on the desert air.

Some village Hampden, that, with dauntless breast,
The little tyrant of his fields withstood,
Some mute inglorious Milton here may rest,
Some Cromwell guiltless of his country's blood.

The applause of listening senates to command,
The threats of pain and ruin to despise,

To scatter plenty o'er a smiling land,

And read their history in a nation's eyes,

Their lot forbad: nor circumscribed alone

Their growing virtues, but their crimes confined; Forbad to wade through slaughter to a throne, And shut the gates of mercy on mankind,

The struggling pangs of conscience truth to hide, To quench the blushes of ingenuous shame,

Or heap the shrine of luxury and pride

With incense kindled at the. Muse's flame.

Far from the madding crowd's ignoble strife,
Their sober wishes never learn'd to stray;
Along the cool sequestered vale of life

They kept the noiseless tenor of their way.
Yet e'en these bones from insult to protect
Some frail memorial still erected nigh,

With uncouth rhymes and shapeless sculpture deck'd,
Implores the passing tribute of a sigh.

Their name, their years, spelt by the unletter'd Muse,
The place of fame and elegy supply:

.And many a holy test around she strews,
That teach the rustic moralist to die.

For who, to dumb forgetfulness a prey,

This pleasing anxious being e'er resign'd,
Left the warm precincts of the cheerful day,
Nor cast one longing lingering look behind?

On some fond breast the parting soul relies,
Some pious drops the closing eye requires;
E'en from the tomb the voice of nature cries,
E'en in our ashes live their wonted fires.

For thee, who, mindful of the unhonour'd dead,
Dost in these lines their artless tale relate;

If chance, by lonely contemplation led,
Some kindred spirit shall inquire thy fate,-

Haply some hoary-headed swain may say,
"Oft have we seen him at the peep of dawn
Brushing with hasty steps the dews away,

To meet the sun upon the upland lawn:

"There at the foot of yonder nodding beech,

That wreathes its old fantastic roots so high, His listless length at noontide would be stretch, And pore upon the brook that babbles by.

"Hard by yon wood, now smiling as in scorn,

Muttering his wayward fancies would he rove; Now drooping, woful-wan, like one forlorn,

Or crazed with care, or cross'd in hopeless love.

"One morn I miss'd him on the custom'd hill, Along the heath, and near his favorite tree; Another came; nor yet beside the rill,

Nor up the lawn, nor at the wood was he:

"The next, with dirges due in sad array

Slow through the churchway path we saw him borne.

Approach and read (for thou can'st read) the lay
Graved on the stone beneath yon aged thorn."

THE EPITAPH.

Here rests his head upon the lap of earth
A youth, to fortune and to fame unknown:
Fair science frown'd not on his humble birth,
And melancholy marked him for her own.

Large was his bounty, and his soul sincere,
Heaven did a recompense as largely send:
He gave to misery (all he had) a tear,

He gain'd from heaven ('twas all he wished) a friend

No farther seek his merits to disclose,

Or draw his frailties from their dread abode, (There they alike in trembling hope repose,) The bosom of his Father and his God.

In Gray's first M.S. of the "Elegy," after the eighteenth stanza, cnding with the word "flame," were the four following stanzas:

The thoughtless world to majesty may bow,
Exalt the brave, and idolize success;

But more to innocence their safety owe,
Than power or genius e'er conspired to bless.

And thou who, mindful of the unhonour'd dead,
Dost in these notes their artless tale relate,
By night and lonely contemplation led

To wander in the gloomy walks of fate:

Hark! how the sacred calm, that breathes around,
Bids every fierce tumultuous passion cease;
In still small accents whispering from the ground,
A grateful earnest of eternal peace.

No more, with reason and thyself at strife,
Give anxious cares and endless wishes room;
But through the cool sequester'd vale of life
Pursue the silent tenor of thy doom.

Here the poem was originally intended to conclude.

After the twenty-fifth stanza, ending with the word "lawn," was the following stanza:

Him have we seen the greenwood side along,
While o'er the heath we hied, our labor done,
Oft as the woodlark piped her farewell song,
With wistful eyes pursue the setting sun.

And in some of the first editions, immediately before "The Epitaph," was the following stanza:

There scatter'd oft, the earliest of the year,

By hands unseen, are showers of violets found;
The red-breast loves to build and warble there,
And little footsteps lightly print the ground.

The plague runs festering through the town, —
And never a bell is tolling;